Few things capture Brooks Tingle’s approach to being a longevity warrior like watching him walk on stage in a dark suit jacket and custom Air Force 1 sneakers earlier this month. The CEO of John Hancock was there to kick off the company’s 3rd annual “Longer. Healthier. Better” symposium for brokers, dispensing the kind of common sense one might expect from someone who’s spent the bulk of his career at a life insurer founded in Boston 164 years ago. Not for him the magic elixirs and fads of his biohacking brethren. Tingle, 60, is a man who thinks about actuarial data and probabilities, about how to transform a largely transactional business that’s betting on your lifespan into a partner in boosting your health span, or how long you’ll live well. “Of course it’s good for the business,” he says, “but I’m also passionate about this stuff.”
Longevity is a hot topic as the country is getting older. The median age is now close to 40, and the percentage of Americans over 65 is projected to grow from 17% today to almost one in four Americans by 2050. One in three will be over 50, a figure that may get higher if immigration slows as the fertility rate of 1.6 births is well below replacement level. Policymakers fret about how to pay for it. Some consumers are moving abroad or delaying retirement because of it.
